CBI court records statements in Nithari killings

Ghaziabad: A special CBI court, hearing the infamous Nithari serial killings case, on Thursday recorded the statements of the Director of a forensic lab and a police officer in connection with the murder of two minor girls.

AK Mittal, director of Forensic Laboratory in Agra, and Chhotey Lal, the then police sub-inspector in Noida, today deposed before special CBI judge Shyam Lal.

The judge was hearing the case pertaining to the murder of 14-year-old Pushpa and 9-year-old Nisha.

A box containing bones and skeletons was also brought to the court by the forensic lab staff to prove that these were recovered from a drain behind the bungalow of businessman Moninder Singh Pandher, one of the suspects in the case.

However, Surender Koli, the main accused and domestic help of Pandher, challenged the allegations made by Mittal and Lal and claimed he was innocent in the case.

A total of 19 cases were filed against Pandher and Koli in connection with the rape and murder of children whose skeletal remains, clothes and footwear were found in Nithari in 2006.

Koli has been given capital punishment in four cases. Pandher and Koli were awarded death penalty by the Ghaziabad court in the case related to the rape and murder of 14-year-old Rimpa Haldar in February 2009, but later the Allahabad High Court acquitted Pandher.